


Pael'lar

by perspi



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Birthday, Gen, Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-02
Updated: 2008-09-02
Packaged: 2017-10-17 11:40:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/176485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perspi/pseuds/perspi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Rodney can't believe his luck, that there are three people who go out of their way to make sure he doesn't eat alone; it feels not unlike how he imagined sitting at the cool kids' table would feel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pael'lar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sheafrotherdon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/gifts).



The first paperclip hits him in the shoulder; Rodney brushes at the spot and wonders what hit him.

The second paperclip hits him on the shell of his ear; Rodney growls and goes back to his work.

The third paperclip lands neatly in his coffee cup with a cheery little _plink_!; Rodney shouts, "You'd better be gone by the time I turn around or so help me, I will unleash my wrath upon you."

"McKay."

"For the love of God, _what_?" Rodney snaps shrilly and turns to see Ronon leaning against a desk near the door to the lab. He's got his arms crossed and doesn't look at all cowed.

"Time to eat," Ronon says.

"But I'm not done," Rodney whines at his back.

"I'm hungry now," Ronon tosses over his shoulder. "C'mon."

Ronon comes to get him for dinner surprisingly often, after he'd followed Sheppard on a 'Rodney-retrieval' during his first year in Atlantis. Sometimes Rodney can't believe his luck, that there are three people who go out of their way to make sure he doesn't eat alone; it feels not unlike how he imagined sitting at the cool kids' table would feel.

But Ronon doesn't lead them to the mess--they pop out of the transporter just outside Teyla's quarters, and Ronon's propelled him through the door before Rodney can ask, "What the hell is this?"

Teyla looks up from arranging food dishes on a large cloth in the middle of the floor just as Sheppard saunters in from the kitchen area with two bottles of _shaena_ wine. She levels a slightly accusing look at Ronon. "You did not tell him?"

Ronon shrugs. "Easier just to bring him."

"Tell me what?"

John settles on a floor cushion, tucking his sock-clad feet under him, and says, "Happy birthday, Rodney." He pats the cushion next to him. "C'mon, we have ham. And cake, Ronon talked Marcheline into making a German chocolate cake."

"But. It's not my birthday," Rodney protests even as he slips off his shoes. "You have ham?"

John holds up a plate, and Ronon explains as Rodney sits down. "On Sateda we don't--didn't--celebrate birthdays like you. The birth anniversary is a celebration of our mothers' labor." He leans forward and slaps two large slabs of ham onto Rodney's plate. "We celebrate _Pael'lar_ , the days you choose your path, the days you begin to live the life you want."

Teyla pours them all good-sized cups of wine. "Ronon only recently explained the idea of _Pael'lar_ to John and me," she says, like that explains it, and Rodney's just about to protest, to make his confusion known, when John asks quietly,

"Last year, today, you remember what we were doing?" At Rodney's look, he says, "Cerrena," and that's all he needs to say.

"The blood-brother thing," Rodney breathes, and he looks to Ronon, to Teyla, to John, this family he never knew he wanted until he had them, until they'd declared each other kin in a short little ceremony on a backward little moon. "Like, a team birthday, right? This is _our_ _Pael'lar_ , all of us together."

He's busy looking down, trying to blink something out of his eye, and so he doesn't see the way the three of them converge on him. Suddenly there's three sets of hands holding him--wrists, shoulders, biceps--and three sets of lips landing kisses on his head.

"Good _Pael'lar_ , Rodney," Ronon rumbles in his ear.

"Good _Pael'lar_ ," Teyla echoes.

"Eat your ham," John says with a chuckle.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2008 for **Sheafrotherdon** 's birthday and posted at the **catenip** comm on Livejournal.


End file.
